Naming of Bihar and Journey of State Formation

• Seeing the many Buddhist Viharas in this region, possibly in the 12th- 13th century the Turkic/Muslim rulers named this region as Viharą which later came to be known as
• The word ‘Bihar’ is first used by Minhas-us-Siraj in Tabaqat-i-Nasiri composed in the thirteenth century (around 1203 AD).
• The word Bihar is also mentioned in Vidyapati’s ‘Kirtilata’ (1390 AD).
• After Aurangzeb’s death, the region came under the control of the Nawabs of Bengal in the 18th century. In 1733, Shujauddin, the Nawab of Bengal, made Bihar a part of the Bengal province.
• The Provincial Assembly was constituted for Bihar by the Regulating Act of 1773 AD.
• In 1865, Patna and Gaya districts were organized separately.
• Sachchidanand Sinha, Mahesh Narayan, Nand Kishore Lal and Shri Krishna Sahai (all four) together started bringing out ‘Bihar Times’ and ‘Bihari’ newspapers from Patna in January, 1894.
• Through this newspaper published under the editorship of Mahesh Narayan the movement for the separation of Bihar started gaining momentum.
• In 1906 AD, Rajendra Babu, who was the minister of ‘Bihari Club’ of Calcutta in those days, after consultation with Dr. Sanchidanand Sinha, Mr. Mahesh Narayan and other leaders, organized a huge “Bihari Student Conference’ in Patna, in which a permanent committee of students was formed. Due to this, the ‘Bihar Separation Movement’ started gaining enough strength.
• In 1908, the first session of ‘Bihar Regional Conference’ was held in Patna In this session, Mohammad Fakhruddin proposed to separate Bihar from Bengal and organize it as a new province, which was accepted unanimously.
• In 1908, the Bihar Provincial Congress Committee was formed in a meeting held under the chairmanship of Nawab Sarfaraz Hussain Khan Thereafter Hasan Imam was elected the first president of the Bihar Provincial Congress Committee.
• In 1909, the second session of ‘Bihar Regional Conference’ was held in Bhagalpur in this too, a strong demand was made to separate Bihar.
• Till 1911, Bihar was a part of Bengal Presidency. In 1911, in the Central Legislative Council, Sachchidanand Sinha and Mohammad Ali proposed the partition of Bihar from Bengal.
• On December 12, 1911, in the Shahi Darbar held in Delhi, in the presence of George V, Governor General Lord Harding announced the formation of a new province by separating the areas of Bihar and Orissa from the Bengal Presidency.
• According to this announcement, on April 1, 1912, a new province of Bihar (including Orissa) was formed by separating an area of 3 lakh 29 thousand 584 square km from Bengal with a population of 3 crore 50 lakh and Patna was made its capital.
• The campaign to make Bihar a separate state was led by Dr. Sachchidanand Sinha and Mahesh Narayan. Therefore, the credit for making Bihar an independent province is given to them.
• On January 20, 1913, the first meeting of the newly formed Council of Lieutenant Governor of Bihar-Orissa was held at Bankipur/Patna, which was presided over by Sir Charles Stuart Bailey, Lieutenant Governor of Bihar-Orissa.
• Patna High Court in 1916 and Patna University in 1917 were also established.
• Under the ‘Government of India Act’ 1919, Bihar and Orissa got the status of ‘Full State in 1920. After this, Lord Satyendra Prasanna Sinha was made the first Governor of Bihar.
• A new building (the present Vidhan Sabha) was constructed in Patna, in which the first meeting of the Bihar and Orissa Legislative Council took place on February 7, 1921. Which was presided over by Sir Moody.
• After the Government of India Act was passed in 1935, on April 1, 1936, a separate state of Orissa was formed from Bihar and a bicameral legislature was established in place of unicameral legislature as provided under the old Government of India Act-1919.
• In 1956, some areas of Purulia and Purnea districts were transferred to West Bengal in order to reorganize the states.
• On November 15, 2000, a new state named Jharkhand was formed by separating the southern part of Bihar (18 districts). Before this division, there were 13 divisions, 55 districts, 54 Lok Sabha and 324 Vidhan Sabha seats in Bihar. After the division, Bihar was left with 9 divisions, 37 districts, 40 Lok Sabha and 243 Vidhan Sabha seats.
• In 2001, the new ‘Arwal’ district was carved out of Jehanabad After this the total number of districts in Bihar became 38.